


Clarity

by Hisvoicebrokemyheart



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Chesapeake Ripper, Gore, M/M, Murder, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Post-Fall (Hannibal), Ravage Anthology, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:21:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26075587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hisvoicebrokemyheart/pseuds/Hisvoicebrokemyheart
Summary: The fall was as much of a baptism as it was a rebirth. A shock of water to the system to cleanse the soul of its sins and dark intent. The grip Will had on Hannibal was something the man would never forget; a desperate, all-consuming touch that sent the Ripper away.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Kudos: 29
Collections: RAVAGE - An Infernal Hannibal Anthology





	Clarity

**Author's Note:**

> Finally posting my submission for the @lovecrimebooks Ravage Anthology. I fell in love with this project as soon as it was announced am grateful to share it now with all of you.

The fall was as much of a baptism as it was a rebirth. A shock of water to the system to cleanse the soul of its sins and dark intent. The grip Will had on Hannibal was something the man would never forget; a desperate, all-consuming touch that sent the Ripper away. 

As Hannibal had gazed upon him, footing faulty, he wondered what it would be like to set his teeth to the open wound that danced across the dark stubble gathered below Will’s cheekbone. When the world began to tumble around him he scrambled for purchase as if Will’s grip on him would never be enough to keep them together as the world has torn them apart time and time again. He wondered — if his hands had found a home at Will’s neck, would the impact of the water below send Will away from him, unreachable for the rest of Hannibal’s natural life. 

ᐧᐧᐧ

Hannibal hadn’t so much as hurt a fly since that night aside from lifting a finger to choose different cuts at the local meat market. His time was spent on both his and Will’s recovery, and his worry had eaten out the room left for the character that had been created for him. Though his priorities had changed, his hunger for inquisition persisted.

It had been months, nearly a year, and he marveled at the potential reactions Will would provide him with if he were to bring the Chesapeake Ripper back to life. Hannibal stood in the kitchen, adding final touches to the meal he had prepared for the two of them while Will was seated at their small dine-in table tucked against a window. He took a moment, lifting the plates, to take in what life had handed him with his own intervention.

Making his escape with Will by his side had provided him with a sight he would never grow tired of. The feeling of Will’s eyes on him was something akin to being flayed open. There was no longer a reason for facades and veils which was more freeing than he imagined. 

Hannibal sat to Will’s left, handing Will his plate so he could pull out his chair. From his seat he could gaze out into the yard before catching Will’s eye.

“How do you think you’d feel if you came face to face with the Chesapeake Ripper?” he asked, breaking the quiet of forks scraping against china.

Will looked up and Hannibal could see a trace of confusion fall across his face.

“Haven’t I already?”

“I can’t say that you have.” 

Hannibal thought back to days when he was young, feeling raw pain caused by Mischa’s death. The unkempt passion shared between himself, Will, and the Great Red Dragon was far removed from that of the motive of the Chesapeake Ripper. There was danger pointed towards someone he held in high graces, it was no act of vigilance, it was mere self preservation.

“I’m not sure how I would feel then,” Will pondered with a wry smile, food ignored before him as he feasted on the answer presented to him. “You say I’ve never sat before Him. There is no way for me to know if I found myself under His thumb.” 

ᐧᐧᐧ

He couldn’t tame the smirk on his lips as the man trembled at his feet, skin flayed, heartbeat slowing from its rapid pace as life began to drift out of reach. Hannibal had seen him few times before, but it was enough. The grip he held to his daughter’s wrist was an undeniable tell, there was no love there. There was no safety. He could imagine that he burns, as he would surrounded by the flaming shores of Hell as he drowned in a flowing river raging with blood. 

Everything was red. Hannibal watched as the blood seeped down the cracks in his forehead, running into his eyes. He ruminated on whether or not Will would see red too. There would be no cleanup here. Blood will flow as far as nature allows. His hands will be risen in rigorous attempts at escape -- arrow piercing through his hands as centaurs would not let him so easily escape. He is violent, but the Ripper is stronger.

Time passed him by. He left the man behind to face his maker, be it cloven hooved or horned. Hannibal envisioned a masterpiece. No longer would the Ripper give sounders with ample time for understanding to marinate. The only one meant to read the scene would know more than enough. 

He needed not search out prey. The next came misguided, a plea of weakness and malice that could not be resisted. There was nothing to do but watch as a woman was given a nudge, motivation to slither forward from her position upon a high tree branch. He sat an unknown voyeur as a young man, no more than twenty-five, watched what could only be his lover swing below him, life fleeting in a struggle of tension. She was lost to the world before he began his descent. 

The Chesapeake Ripper was there to meet him on the ground. With a cut to the throat he was returned to his perch to keep watch over her tortured soul. The Ripper spread him in a blood eagle with wings of bone and broken skin. His heart hung from his open wounds before the Ripper took it to share with his own. He did all that He could to provide a tortured soul with a Harpie to sit in watch and feed from her branches. 

A final tribute was found amongst his calling cards. Will must have noticed that Hannibal had left him to the night alone. He could feel himself being traced like a breath of hot air against his neck. In pursuit of a sinner he could hear the click of cloven hooves mirroring his footsteps. This must be what it feels like to walk side by side with malevolence of a divine power. Hannibal had never shied from blasphemy, as there was no God worthy of his fear and compliance. If a God were to enjoy forbidden activities alone, then one could never be closer to God than when indulging alongside Him.

Hannibal had seen a man while he was walking through the town square. He droned on about false Gods and the fallacy of divinity to which Hannibal did not find much insult, but it was most certainly out of place in front of a house of worship. 

This man had crossed God. He had fallen from the path in an act of free will and was to burn for it. Blasphemy defamed the word of God and though common, would not go unpunished. The Ripper left him stripped of his clothing, crouched with palms raised high in a desperate plea for relief from the promise of a burning afterlife. A bible sat aflame at his feet and the Ripper had cut him open from chest to navel. There was nothing the man could hide from Him as his eyes slid closed and grains of sand from a desert of entrapment stole him from the world. Blood was warm on His hands, beading up at the tip of the blade’s handle and running down along His palm to kiss at His wrist. A sensation of mortality struck the Ripper as this fluid reflected the fire flowing through His own veins. 

ᐧᐧᐧ

Hannibal was wholly sated, preening under the heated gaze Will had thrown him upon returning to their home. Both he and the Ripper had been waiting for Will in the office set just beside the front door. Those who wronged Him had been punished, memorialized in their sins and dedicated to one worshipped by the devil Himself. He knew that Will had seen this through each ring of fire he stepped through. Though the Ripper exacted violent displays with a power wielded by no other, He bowed at the foot of one man, bearing His own sins before him. 

He could feel the rise and fall of Will’s abdomen with one arm wrapped firmly around his torso, Hannibal’s other hand spread wide across his neck. In the briefest of moments he considered what Will would look like as he struggled to breathe beneath Hannibal’s own grip, no source of deception to provide any distortion of sensation. He thought of what brought them to this moment. 

“Have you found clarity, Will? In this moment, are you sure?”

Hannibal felt Will close the remaining distance between them. The hot press of Will’s back to his chest had Hannibal closing his eyes and dipping his head to take in the sweet scent of the man against him. He was unable to hide the tremble in his fingers as they encouraged Will to tilt his head up and back to rest on his shoulder. 

“Yes.”


End file.
